Bible-quoting cheerleaders have the state on their team

By Peggy Fikac :
October 17, 2012
: Updated: October 18, 2012 1:24am

Coti Matthews, right, and Macy Matthews, 15, left, during a court hearing on cheerleaders' rights to put Bible verses on banners, in Kountze, Texas, Oct. 4, 2012. In Kountze, cheerleaders' writing of Bible verses on banners has led to a lawsuit and questions about religious expression at public school events.

Photo By Dave Ryan/Associated Press

File - In this Sept. 19, 2012 file photo, Kountze High School cheerleaders and other children work on a large sign in Kountze, Texas. Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott announced Wednesday that he is intervening in a lawsuit that cheerleaders filed against the school district. The district told the cheerleaders to stop using Bible verses at football games after the Freedom From Religion Foundation complained. (AP Photo/The Beaumont Enterprise, Dave Ryan, File)

AUSTIN — With Gov. Rick Perry and Attorney General Greg Abbott front and center, the state of Texas is siding with high school cheerleaders in their court fight to continue citing Bible verses on high school football banners.

“The First Amendment does not demand hostility toward religion,” Abbott said at a Wednesday news conference with Perry to announce the state is intervening in the lawsuit to support the Kountze High School cheerleaders.

They were flanked by photos of a team breaking through a banner emblazoned with the phrase, “If God is for us, who can be against us?”

Kountze football players have run through the Bible-themed banners at their games, bringing a debate about religious freedom and the First Amendment to the 2,100-resident town.

The banners prompted a complaint on constitutional grounds from the Freedom From Religion Foundation, which said it was acting to protect the separation of church and state after a concern was raised by a local resident.

Superintendent Kevin Weldon banned the signs, with a lawyer for the district saying school officials, though Christian, simply were trying to follow the law.

The cheerleaders' families filed a lawsuit against Weldon and the district, obtaining a temporary restraining order to allow them to continue to use the signs on an interim basis.

A hearing on a temporary injunction to keep the signs going is scheduled today in state district court in Hardin County.

On the eve of the hearing, Abbott and Perry were proudly defending the intersection of faith and football.

Perry, a former Aggie yell leader, said he visited with the cheerleaders by Skype before Friday's game to lend his support: “I just told them I was proud of them for standing up for their beliefs.

“If you think about it, the Kountze cheerleaders simply wanted to call a little attention to their faith and to their Lord. The Lord does work in mysterious ways, so they are accomplishing their goal.”

Abbott lambasted the Wisconsin-based Freedom From Religion Foundation, accusing it of using “menacing and misleading intimidation tactics.”

Annie Laurie Gaylor, co-president of the foundation, said the signs were at a school-sanctioned event.

“These cheerleaders represent the school district, and government speech may not endorse religion,” she said. “They are supposed to represent school spirit. They are not supposed to represent the spirit of Jesus.”

Tom Brandt, the Dallas-based attorney representing Kountze Independent School District, said the district's decision to ban the banners was a straightforward effort to interpret what officials understood to be the law at the time.

He cited the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in a case involving Santa Fe ISD, which held that student-led prayers at a public high school game violated the Establishment Clause.

“It's hard for us to figure out how the banners aren't analogous to the situation with speech in Santa Fe,” Brandt said.

Brandt said the school superintendent and board members are Christian, and that they didn't want to violate anyone's rights by either endorsing a religion or being hostile toward a religion.

“We are trying to walk a thin line,” Brandt said.

Abbott's court petition in intervention said the state has “an undeniable interest” in defending the constitutionality of Texas laws, citing in particular a law requiring school districts to treat students' voluntary religious expression in the same way as other expression.

The school district said that to the extent any state law required officials to violate the Establishment Clause forbidding the establishment of religion, that such laws also are unconstitutional, Abbott's petition said.

This isn't the first time the state has joined a fight over schools and religion. In 2011, Abbott jumped into a lawsuit filed by an agnostic family that sued the Medina Valley Independent School District.

In that case, Chief U.S. District Judge Fred Biery of San Antonio banned organized prayer at last year's commencement at Medina Valley High School in Castroville but allowed students to invoke individual religious beliefs.

The district appealed, with backing from Abbott and last year's valedictorian. As a result, a federal appeals court disagreed with Biery, and organized prayer abounded at June's graduation. The case brought threats against Biery, and criticism against him from then-presidential candidate Newt Gingrich.

The case later resulted in a settlement in which the district agreed that administrators and other employees will not pray with students, elicit prayer, proselytize or display religious artifacts in the classroom (except jewelry).